


You Lead, I Follow

by Sid45ultra



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: M/M, Major character death - Freeform, Non Graphic, One sided, Past Relationship(s), Suicide, may be triggering, nongraphic sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-30
Updated: 2017-01-30
Packaged: 2018-09-20 21:56:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9517799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sid45ultra/pseuds/Sid45ultra
Summary: Kaidan Alenko looked at Commander John Shepard how most men looked at the stars. He was beautiful and unreachable, but then again, Kaidan had spent most of his life among them.(This is short and may upset some people)





	

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this over a year ago when I was struggling with severe depression. It is short and sad. SUICIDE. Be warned, this isn't happy.

Kaidan remembered the first time John Shepard fell into his arms. He'd always looked up to the great Commander Shepard, even after he'd gone over to Cerberus. Kaidan had been angry, but a small part of him admired Shepard for doing whatever he had to in order to get the job done. He'd tried to squash that part many times both before and after John's supposed death, but had all ways remained, like the persistent buzz of his L2 implant. Kaidan had watched Shepard seduce women across the galaxy as they fought everything life and the reapers threw at them. He'd never expected Shepard to ever look his way, and he was content with that. It hurt, but he was content to love and admire the Commander without ever touching the living legend. Until Shepard came to him. Word had come down the pipe that they'd found the crash site of the Normandy SR1. Everyone from the original crew had offered to accompany Shepard to place the monument but he'd chosen to go alone. Kaidan had waited in his quarters for hours, filling out paper work, reading, listening to music, anything to take his mind off Shepard, walking alone through all he'd lost. Kaidan didn't regret his words on Horizon, but he wished he'd been able to help Shepard recover from his ordeal. He knew how the Commander stared through the windows of the observation deck, how his eyes tracked the emptiness barely separated by plexiglass. He'd been trying to sleep when Shepard had stumbled into his room, steps heavy and words slurring together. The man would have fallen if Kaidan hadn't caught him in time. They'd sat together, the Commander looking more broken and defeated than Kaidan had ever seen him. Shepard had tried to kiss him that night, smelling of whiskey, the weight of the galaxy bowing his shoulders. Kaidan hadn't allowed him to, he'd pushed him away then helped him back to his cabin. In the morning both men pretended the event had never happened. Life went on, the Genophage was cured, Rannoch was returned to the Quarians, Thessia fell. Shepard found others arms to fall into, his relationship with Liara rekindled until his eyes saw no others but her. Kaidan watched it all, fighting silently along side the man he loved, standing as one of the witnesses, along with Garrus and Tali, at Shepard's and Liara's small union. The war continued, the galaxy slowly giving ground to the Reaper forces. Shepard came to him again one night, after a fight with Liara over which he wouldn't say though Kaidan suspected it was regarding children. He'd comforted the Commander and when the man kissed him he didn't push him away. They slept together that night, Shepard angry and passionate, Kaidan feeling more love and guilt than he'd thought possible. He didn't see much of Shepard in the weeks that followed, always entering a room just as Shepard was leaving or being given different orders on missions. The final fight came on Earth, all the forces of the Galaxy pulling together to make a final stand against the reapers. And Shepard had died. Like anyone else, he'd been killed in the greatest war in the combined histories of the Galaxy. He was celebrated on every world of every star system, he became a legend over night, an almost god like figure to those who hadn't known him. "Remember the Shepard." Mothers told their children, holding him up as an example of virtue in a war torn world. Kaidan would always remember John, the man he'd loved and the man who'd died like all the rest. Liara bore Shepard a child he'd never see, Garrus named his own son after him, Tali founded a city on Rannoch, naming it Shepard's Stand in the old tongue of the Quarians. Everywhere were mementos and tributes to the great Commander Shepard, to his ship, to his crew. But Shepard was never found, his body never recovered from the place he'd died. Kaidan's heart became lead as he was promoted through the ranks, becoming an Admiral less than ten years after the Reaper War. He was in London the day he made his final decision, he could move on, find someone else to love, or he could stay in the past heart longing for a man who had never chosen him to begin with. He stared up at the monument of the man he'd loved, saluted, then returned to his apartment. That night he drank what was left of his good whiskey, took out his Predator, the one he'd carried on Eden Prime all those years ago, and joined his love with the twitch of a finger.


End file.
